NATO meets on Libya as air strikes intensify

NATO foreign ministers gathered on Thursday in Berlin amid calls for increased air strikes on Moamer Kadhafi’s forces and growing divisions among world powers over whether to arm Libya’s rebels.

The meeting came as NATO planes put on a show of force Thursday above the Libyan front line, with rebels reporting they were bombing targets on the road leading west, towards the key oil town of Brega, and beyond that Kadhafi’s home town of Sirte and, farther, the capital Tripoli.

France and Britain agreed to step up military pressure on Kadhafi’s forces after an international contact group on Libya meeting in Doha promised the rebels cash and the means to defend themselves.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister David Cameron agreed on increased military pressure at a working dinner in Paris ahead of the Berlin meeting, a source in the French presidency said.